National Parks, Monuments and Seashores

News about National Parks, Monuments and Seashores, including commentary and archival articles published in The New York Times.

Chronology of Coverage

Feb. 26, 2015

Editorial welcomes Pres Obama's designation of new federally-protected lands in Illinois, Colorado and Hawaii; holds that designations are in line with the spirit of Theodore Roosevelt, and give America a richer understanding of its history. MORE

Feb. 20, 2015

Pres Obama, visiting Chicago to sign proclamation creating the Pullman National Monument, gives hearty endorsement to former chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, who faces re-election in one week. MORE

Dec. 22, 2014

Dispute over proposal to ban fishing in 6 percent of Florida's Biscayne National Park is prompting questions about fairness and consistency of national park policies; federal officials say rules designed to protect resources and ecosystems in national parks seem to get short shrift when applied to marine parks. MORE

Dec. 16, 2014

Senate joins House in passing legislation to establish Manhattan Project National Historical Park, memorializing secretive World War II effort to build atom bomb; park will protect hundreds of surviving buildings and artifacts across New Mexico, Washington and Tennessee, where scientists developed bomb. MORE

Oct. 2, 2014

Editorial applauds Pres Obama's use of his Antiquities Act authority to expand the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument from 87,000 square miles to nearly 500,000 square miles; notes commercial fishing or seabed mining now will not be allowed, keeping ocean pristine; holds benefits to environment and animals will be profound, especially if other countries follow Obama's example. MORE

Sep. 2, 2014

Editorial marks passage of Wilderness Act and the law establishing Land and Water Conservation Fund, fifty years ago; contends laws commemorate a time when Congress could work in bipartisan fashion to protect clean air, clean water and endangered species; urges Pres Obama to continue to use his executive authority to protect important landscapes by declaring them national monuments. MORE

Aug. 30, 2014

Timothy Egan Op-Ed column heralds triumph of the national park system in the American West; observes parks are thriving, along with the wildlife inside them, to the chagrin of conservatives who say government ownership is doomed to failure; examines several Western cities that are existing in increasing harmony with the ecosystems around them. MORE

Aug. 25, 2014

Editorial praises National Park Service for imposing temporary ban on the use of airborne drones by visitors to national parks and monuments; holds proliferation of noisy devices, which are becoming increasingly affordable, had begun to impede on serenity of other visitors. MORE

Aug. 10, 2014

Op-Ed article by author Kevin Fedarko warns that Grand Canyon faces desecration on two fronts from developers; notes that on South Rim plateau town of Tusayan has approved development plans that will deplete important aquifer, and 25 miles to northeast Navajo leaders are working with developers to construct tramway to the canyon floor; asserts that both projects show how status of park is ephemeral and must be protected. MORE

Jun. 26, 2014

Kit Eaton Appsmart column; highlights of national parks apps; visitors can get details on attractions, animals, camps, parking, the weather and more on their mobile devices. MORE

Apr. 25, 2014

National Park Service and Yosemite Conservancy are teaming on $36 million project to improve lot of giant sequoias in Yosemite National Park; philanthropic organizations known for lending helping hand are funneling millions of dollars into nation's major national parks. MORE

Mar. 12, 2014

Pres Obama moves to preserve more than 1,600 acres of coastal land in Northern California by declaring them part of California Coastal National Monument. MORE

Feb. 5, 2014

Presidio Trust, stewards of national park land at base of Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, rejects museum proposal by George Lucas, producer and creator of Star Wars films; Lucas wants showcase for his collection of popular art and had pledged $700 million to build and endow it. MORE

Jan. 10, 2014

Lucas St Clair and his mother Roxanne Quimby have been trying for years to turn her 75,000 acres in Maine's North Woods into national park, but have met fierce opposition, partly because many residents loathe idea of giving Washington a toehold there; process of creating national park is difficult. MORE

Nov. 10, 2013

Government shutdown has done little to slow preparations for cross-country skiing, snowshoeing, snowmobiling and other winter activities in the national parks, many of which have reopened in time to start preparations for the season. MORE

Oct. 20, 2013

Colorado has adopted temporary measures to give tourists access to some of its national parks before aspen go bare; state's tourism industry took a one-two punch with September floods and landslides followed by government shutdown on Oct 1 that forced parks to close. MORE

Oct. 11, 2013

Governors of Arizona, Colorado, South Dakota and Utah express interest in proposal by Interior Secretary Sally Jewell to allow them to reopen national parks in their states closed by federal government shutdown, though it remains unclear whether any such deals could be reached soon; agreements would hinge on states paying full operating costs. MORE

Oct. 11, 2013

Federal government shutdown’s economic toll is particularly evident in gateway communities to national parks, where local businesses live or die on tourist traffic; governors in some Western states urge Interior Department to reopen parks, or to allow states to do so if they pay for some day-to-day operations. MORE

Oct. 6, 2013

Some couples who planned their weddings in national parks are forced to find new wedding sites after government shutdown leads to closing of all national sites. MORE

Oct. 1, 2013

Students in Atlanta planning a trip to the Martin Luther King Jr. National Historic Site got a lesson in what happens when political leaders cannot agree. MORE

Sep. 6, 2013

National Park Service is scrambling to rethink and redefine itself to growing number of Americans from minority populations who do not use the parks in way that previous--mostly white--generations did; only about one in five visitors to national park site is nonwhite, and only about 1 in 10 is Hispanic. MORE

Sep. 1, 2013

Nicholas D Kristof Op-Ed column contends that America's wilderness trails, which while spectacular and free, are horrendously neglected; laments that the agencies responsible for taking care of public lands have had their budgets severely cut; urges members of Congress to hike the Pacific Crest Trail to see for themselves the grandeur of public lands of which they are such wretched stewards. MORE

Jun. 21, 2013

National Park Service officials say that 150 employees and 50 guests at Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks have contracted norovirus, highly contagious gastrointestinal illness; issue warning to visitors to two parks to wash their hands to avoid virus. MORE

Jun. 5, 2013

Staff at Saguaro National Park in Arizona say there is reason to believe that spike in vandalism and graffiti on public lands coincides with the rise of social media; vandals, who are even defacing majestic saguaro cactuses, are posting pictures of damage they have wrought on Facebook and other social media sites; unprecedented level and nature of vandalism is unnerving park officials across Western states. MORE

May. 19, 2013

Christopher Solomon travel article in which he describes his love of America's most remote corners; one such place is Aniakchak National Monument and Preserve in Alaska, least-visited of the 401 National Park Service properties. MORE

Apr. 23, 2013

Some national parks will have reduced visiting hours and maintenance because of the across-the-board spending cuts known as the sequester. MORE

Apr. 12, 2013

Op-Ed article by Cheyenne River Sioux Chief Joseph Brings Plenty warns spiritual heritage of Wounded Knee site in South Dakota is in danger of becoming a real-estate transaction; notes private owner of site, where hundreds of Lakota were massacred in 1890, could sell it to highest bidder; contends federal government should buy land and preserve it as national monument. MORE

Mar. 22, 2013

President Obama, who has been criticized for favoring oil and gas development over land conservation in his first term, on Monday will designate five new national monuments, according to officials briefed on the decision. MORE

Feb. 27, 2013

United States Court of Appeals rules that Drakes Bay Oyster Company can continue operating until the court decides whether to move forward on company's lawsuit challenging its eviction from the Point Reyes National Seashore in Northern California. MORE

Feb. 26, 2013

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar says that while no national parks, monuments or wildlife refuges will be closed, services will be curtailed if federal spending cuts go into effect. MORE

Dec. 17, 2012

Rule changes in federal retirement system, which Congress began phasing in as far back as 2009, are about to result in unprecedented changes at Alaska's parks and preserves, with scores of top officials and senior managers opting for early retirement. MORE

Nov. 30, 2012

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar ends longstanding dispute that pitted wilderness advocates against supporters of Northern California oyster farm, announcing farm's lease from Point Reyes National Seashore will end as originally planned; estuary where Drakes Bay Oyster Co operation has existed for 40 years will become federally designated wilderness area. MORE

Jul. 18, 2012

New York City and the National Park Service formalize a partnership to jointly manage more than 10,000 acres of parkland in and around Jamaica Bay; joint venture will improve access, foster research, run education and recreation programs and plan restoration projects for the bay, an important estuary and migratory stopover for hundreds of species of birds. MORE

Jun. 24, 2012

Tony Perrottet travel article on his trip retracing the 1872 route taken by New Yorker George Bird Grinnell, headed to Nebraska to hunt buffalo with the Pawnee Indians; journey finds answers to the mystery of what happened to Grinnell, who became one of the nation's pioneers in the fight for national parks, and to the tribe itself, vanquished by 1875. MORE

Jun. 17, 2012

Grand Junction Journal; some people want to turn Colorado National Monument into a national park to draw more tourists, but others worry that any benefits might be outweighed by traffic and congestion that would come with greater visibility; online survey finds people evenly split on changes to the monument, which had 435,000 visitors in 2011, compared with 2.5 million people who visited Zion National Park in Utah. MORE

Mar. 8, 2012

Andrew Adam Newman Advertising column notes that marketers for General Mills’ Nature Valley brand, inspired by Google's Street View, have taken cameras to three national parks for hiker’s-eye views of trails; notes that absent from the site is any explicit pitch for granola bars. MORE

Feb. 6, 2012

Colorado officials are proposing an alternative to a long-disputed national regulation preventing road building on millions of acres of national forests in the West; proponents say new regulation would be better tailored to Colorado's specific needs, but environmentalists contend it will reduce protection. MORE

Nov. 14, 2011

Representative Denny Rehberg of Montana is among 32 co-sponsors of bill that would allow border agents to circumvent dozens of environmental laws in nation's parks that fall within the country's 100-mile border zone; supporters argue it will help cut through bureaucratic gridlock to help shore up border protection while critics wonder if it is worth marring wilderness areas that have been protected for a century or more. MORE

Nov. 10, 2011

Jon Jarvis, top federal parks official, abruptly blocks ban on sale of disposable water bottles in Grand Canyon National Park after meeting with representatives of the Coca-Cola company; Coca-Cola, which distributes water under Dasani brand, has donated more than $13 million to the National Park Foundation. MORE

June 5, 2013, Wednesday

It is safe to say that in 1916, when the National Park Service was created, no one could have imagined how the institution would be marking its 96th birthday: a Web site created with mobile devices in mind. The service, whose Aug. 25 birthday was...

YOU won't want to shoo these flies away from the picnic table. Hemmerle's iron, silver and gold earrings are set with emeralds and brilliant green tsavorite garnets, named after the Tsavo National Park in Kenya, near where many of these gemstones...

April 9, 2012, Monday

The blooms may be off the branches, but there is still plenty left of the monthlong National Cherry Blossom Festival, including a kite-flying extravaganza on Saturday on the grounds of the Washington Monument. Where to eat when you are taking it all...

March 30, 2012, Friday

The landscape of Washington appears fixed, iconic. The Capitol building, the monuments -- Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln -- are all instantly recognizable and they are illuminated each evening. But this spring the skyline is changing. The Hirshhorn...

February 9, 2012, Thursday

ELLIOTT KEY, Fla. -- Like many Florida schemes, the city of Islandia sprang from the delusions of land developers who imagined a rollicking resort town on an inaccessible speck of coral rock north of Key Largo. In the end, their dreams were just...